HaloMetroid: Crisis Rising
by Santiprogo
Summary: A MetroidHalo crossover. Samus' pursuit of the Space Pirates after the events of Metroid Fusion has led her to the conflict between the Covenant and humanity, with Master Chief in the middle of it.
1. Chapter 1

_Author's Notes: This is my first fanfic, I've decided to do a Halo, Metroid crossover. I don't plan on having every chapter telling all 4 points of view each time, I just thought it would be a good idea to do it the first chapter, to give a clear idea of where the characters are starting out from. This takes place right after Halo 2, and 3 months after Metroid: Fusion. Hope you enjoy it, I've done my best to not bastardize either franchises._

**Halo-Metroid: Crisis Rising**

** Chapter One **

**High Charity Ruins  
10.21.2552(Military Calendar)  
22:25 **

"I will ask, and you will answer." said the Gravemind as it stretched it's tentacles towards the Holopanel. Cortana raised a hand to stop them. If she was separated from the city network, she would be useless, not only to the Master Chief, but to this thing too. Obviously it had come in the In Amber Clad, bringing the Flood with it. The tentacles may be right in front of her, but she knew that the actual Gravemind was residing (possibly unable to get out of) that ship. She needed time; she would have to go along with the Gravemind for now.

"All right, shoot."

"Where has the ship of the ancient ones, 'fore runners', gone to?"

Cortana pondered how she would answer the question. Telling this thing about Earth would be a bad idea. Then again, lying to this creature would be a bad idea as well. But, the Gravemind had no possible way to get to Earth. Even if the In Amber Clad could still run, she could detonate it before it got a chance to activate its slip-space drive. Any remaining covenant ship that hadn't been used for evacuation was too small to enter slip-space without destroying the shuttle.

"It's heading to the planet Earth. If you're thinking about stopping them, which you more than likely are, forget it. There's no ship here that can take you to a location so far away."

"That does not concern me. I have sent the Reclaimer you call 'spartan', to take care of the matter concerning the Ark. I am not in a hurry, though I assure I will make my way there in time. I have listened to what your enemies know of the human race, I am not ignorant of what obstacles await them at the Ark."

Cortana logged into the network's surveillance systems to overlook the city. There was not a trace of food for the Flood; the last group of covenant on the city, several elites and hunters, escaped on a phantom about ten minutes ago. Now that there was no way to quench their insatiable hunger, the Flood were tame. Clearly the Gravemind was their leader; they all stationed themselves at the wrecked ship containing it. The only exception was a large group waiting expectantly at the largest dock in High Charity. They all had their heads turned towards the sky. Cortana moved the camera view up to try to see what they were looking at, nothing. This was very odd, and more than a little unsettling.

"Now I want to ask you a question. What exactly are you, Gravemind?"

She quickly went back to surveillance to see if the Flood at the landing dock had changed at all.

"I am a creation of the ancient race you call Fore-runners. When they discovered the Flood, they wanted to use them as Bio-Weapons against an enemy race of theirs. The conflict that led them to this is irrelevant. Both races are extinct and long-gone; their outstanding technologies now remain as their only testament. When they tried to bring sentience and obedience to the Flood, I was the only successful product of their experimentation.

But, when other less successful experiments went beyond their control, there was an outbreak. They were forced to activate the rings, and I was contained safe inside one of those rings. I am the only intelligent form of Flood. I have control over my kind; I alone can bring order and tactical formation for battle like the Fore-runners had always planned."

"Like the way you have all of them situated by your taxi ship?" Cortana asked.

"Well, not all of them…" The Gravemind replied, with a sinister chuckle.

Cortana, not liking that response, immediately switched back to surveillance. The Flood by the dock were running haphazardly around the dock with excitement as they gazed upward. Cortana moved the camera view upward again to see a ship starting to descend. The Flood stopped their wayward movement and, as if directed to, they took positions in hiding places that the ship would never see them in.

Now the Flood station by the In Amber Clad began marching in ranks like troops, in the direction of the landing dock. Cortana gasped, a habit she had picked up from humans, at the sight. She quickly activated the emergency alarm for the docking area, but the ship didn't take any heed at all to the alarms.

"Heh, heh, heh… I did tell you that I will make my way there in time, did I not?"

**Location Unknown-Far beyond Galactic Federation Borders  
2-19 20X9(Cosmic Year)  
18.87 Hours**

It had been nearly three months since her mission in the Biological Space Labs against the X parasites. The Galactic Federation had not taken her direct violation of their orders well. They had asked her to abort her mission when they got the idea that the X parasites which had overrun the space station could be used as a biological weapon. Knowing that the risk of another outbreak was too great, Samus had set the station on a collision course with the adjacent planet that the X parasites had come from. This made a successful destruction of the entire X parasite species, doing the Federation a favor they would never appreciate. They wanted her to come in for personal questioning, but Samus wouldn't allow it. She knew that "personal questioning", meant interrogation in a building where they could throw her in a cell for however long they damn well pleased. She would only answer the questions of the rabid politicians and leaders via telecommunication.

She didn't have the time to go to the Galactic Federation headquarters anyway. Not even a full hour after destroying the station and that hellhole planet, she had been attacked by rogue Space Pirate battleships. They had left in a hurry when she returned fire, and she had been following them ever since.

Now she was in a part of the universe completely uncharted and unknown. The blue green planet she was staring at right now was the first thing she had seen in about five days.

At that moment the A.I on her ship, named Adam, interrupted her thoughts.

"Samus, there are two artificial structures up ahead, orbiting this planet. There is also a Space Pirate ship docking on one of the structures."

Samus leaned forward and tried to see what Adam was talking about. She couldn't see the two things Adam had mentioned, but didn't care.

"Then speed up the ship and take us right to that Space Pirate ship. We're in pursuit of them, and don't have a second to spare."

As the ship accelerated, she could finally see the two objects in orbit around the planet. One was a large ring, and the other looked like a city station. Oddly enough, the city station seemed to be devoid of light, or any semblance of electricity. When she asked Adam about it, he said the same thing.

"Their power source has been disengaged for a short while; some of the systems seem to be working on residual power. The city is called 'High Charity', and it's broadcasting an emergency warning signal. The Space Pirates have taken no notice of it."

"Then neither will we Adam, take us down. Drop me off at the other end of the city, away from the Space Pirates. Then I want you to go somewhere hidden and safe, preferably off the ground and safe from whatever might have warranted that emergency signal."

As the ship swooped down upon the city, Samus could see nothing but seemingly empty buildings. The largest of them stood in the center of the city imposingly. Adam came to a halt right in front of it. Samus leaped out of the above hatch and did a graceful flip onto the ground.

"The broadcast is coming from a location right only a few kilometers next to a crash site. If you go in the direction of the smoke on the other side of this building, you'll reach it. That seems to be where the Space Pirates are landing, I didn't have enough time to scan the area. I could detect an extremely high level of activity there though, be careful."

"Thank you Adam, I'll get in touch with you when something happens."

Samus turned to the doors of looming building, and walked in. It was absolute darkness in there, so she put on her heat visor. There was nothing as far as she could see, the hallway she had stepped into was empty. There was nothing but discarded weapons and doors that looked like they had been forced open. As Samus proceeded through the halls, she still saw nothing. After the first five minutes, she decided to pick up the pace and start running. The clanking sound of her metallic foot steps echoed off the walls, and she tried every other visor she had to try to find anything out of the ordinary. Still nothing.

Then she stepped into a large chamber, there was remnants of a large scale fight her, there were more dropped weapons and shards of armor here than any other room she had been in so far. Over at a corner were some bodies, the first she had seen. The bodies were heavily armored, and on their right arms were permanently wielded cannons. Only a little bit of the flesh underneath the armor could be seen in the neck, and lower torso regions. She kicked one of the bodies over, and saw several little monsters that looked like squid feeding on its flesh.

They turned to look at her, and Samus scanned them quickly. They were parasitic, reproduced very quickly, and had an extremely low body temperature. That was all the information her scan visor could tell her. She fired her cannon at them, destroying all three of them with two shots. It was the only interesting thing that would happen to her until she finally got to the other end of the building.

About ten minutes later, Samus blew a hole through the last door she would have to walk through. When she stepped through, she finally saw what had caused the disaster on High Charity. All around her, parasite and Space Pirate were engaged in frenetic combat.

**Halo activation structure  
Ninth Age of reclamation  
22:35(human time)**

Sergeant Johnson looked to the Arbiter and asked, "So how do we get off this ring, and back to earth?"

"There are plenty of Phantoms in the area, especially now that the Brutes here have been eliminated. Unfortunately those can't take us all the way to Earth. Unless we find a ship large enough to have a slip-space drive here, the fastest way would be to take a phantom to High Charity and steal ourselves a ship from there. Either way, I don't want to leave the ring without taking some of my allies with us."

Captain Keyes was not in their conversation at all. Instead, she was throwing questions at 343 Guilty Spark concerning Earth, the Ark, and the other Halos.

"I am afraid that the Ark needs no index in order to be activated, young Reclaimer. Once the Ark is activated, every Halo in the universe will trigger, leaving all life in the universe dead; with the exception of those on the Ark, of course."

"Well, we better figure out what we're going to do and make it snappy. I think you better find your friends quickly if we're going to get to Earth in time." the sergeant remarked.

But there was no need; Elites, Hunters, and Grunts were marching in droves through the doorway. Some of them pointed their guns hesitantly at the humans, but most were just happy to see the dead bodies of the brutes. An Elite wearing white armor stepped forth from the crowd and addressed the Arbiter.

"Arbiter, we all heard what you just said while we were walking down the hall. I can tell you all ready that there isn't a ship bigger than a Phantom to spare. Several of our number have just come from High Charity. I'm afraid I have no good news to report of that once holy city. The Flood have infested the entire place, by now it'll be a wasteland. The Prophet of Truth took a ship to Earth right before the Flood outbreak started, and the remainder of the Covenant army is with him."

"Damn it! Do you have any good news for us then, big guy?" the Sergeant asked.

"No, and I actually have a little more bad news. Since the number of the Covenant Army has been halved because of the rebellion, they have contacted some allies from a remote sector of the galaxy."

"I've never heard of the Prophets allying themselves with anybody unless they became a member of the Covenant! Brother, our own leaders have committed a heresy! Who are they?"

"They are a shady orgranization called, 'Space Pirates'."

**Earth's Orbit  
10.21.2552(Military Calendar)  
22:30**

"Update me on our situation Admiral Hood."

"Well Master Chief, it's pretty bad. The Covenant army had us at stalemate until we can get more reinforcements here. Unfortunately, that takes a while, and they still haven't arrived yet. But now, the Covenant seems to have brought reinforcements of their own. I've never seen or heard of these before, but they call themselves 'Space Pirates'. They're not as advanced with their technology as the Covenant is, but they've got some pretty big numbers. We're losing Chief, and I have no idea when our reinforcements will get here, or where they are. Would care to update me on yours? How did you get here, and what is that ship?"

"This ship is a Fore-runner ship, and right now I am a stowaway on it. In here is the Prophet of Truth, along with the High Guard."

"-Ah, well that explains why your ship now has an entire Covenant fleet in defensive formation around it. We couldn't blow it out of the sky if we wanted to. What happened when Keyes followed that Covenant ship into slip-space?"

"Well sir, we found another Halo. I was able to take out the Prophet of Regret, and I also reached a Covenant city next to the Halo. Now the Covenant city is overrun by Flood, and the Prophet of Mercy is dead as well. The Covenant thinks this is holy ground, and they intend to finish what they started. I had to leave Cortana back on the city; there was a group of Brutes making their way to Halo to activate it. Considering the fact that we aren't all dead yet, either the Brutes weren't successful, or Cortana was."


	2. Chapter 2:Departure

_Author's Notes: Here's the second chapter. I would have finished and uploaded it sooner, but circumstances got in the way. Oh well, here it is. I've decided to try to keep the format pretty true to what the first chapter was like, instead of changing it. _

**Chapter Two: Departure **

**Halo activation structure  
Ninth Age of reclamation  
22:55 (human time)**

"Well then, the situation is really FUBAR now." Sergeant Johnson replied "If that city's nothing but a Flood farm, then we have no way to get to Earth. Our Pelicans and your Phantoms can't make that kind of trip."

Keyes chimed in, "But just because there are Flood at High Charity, doesn't mean we can't try to find a slip-space ship there. I'm sure there's at least one ship there we can find."

The two humans and the covenant rebels sat in a circle on the shore only about half a mile away from where they just were. Surrounding their circle were Phantoms that had been brought here from all over the area. The Phantoms were prepared to leave, once they reached a decision it would take less than a minute to get going. Some of them were in the cockpits of the Phantoms, leaving their audio surveillance and transmission system on. This meant that they would be able to hear the discussion going on outside. They also did the good dead of broadcasting everything going on to the others were patrolling the area in Banshees, making sure that they weren't about to be ambushed by any stray Brutes. Of course, the ones being forced on patrol duty were Grunts.

343 Spark chimed in for the first time since when he was explaining the Ark to Keyes.

"Excuse me, but are you suggesting entering this city "High Charity" that is overrun by infected Flood hosts?"

"I'd hate to sound scared Keyes, but going into a city that's brimming with Flood is one of the worst ideas I've ever heard of." the Sergeant remarked. The Arbiter and the people who had barely escaped High Charity when the Flood outbreak occurred nodded in agreement.

"I don't think we really have a choice. If we're going to stop the Prophet of Truth from reaching the Ark, we need to get their fast. If he really left for Earth in a ship 25 minutes ago, then he's already reached Earth a while ago." Everyone else still looked unsure about the plan. Keyes rolled her eyes and began making a chart in the sand with her finger as she talked.

"I've got a plan I think you all will like. We go into our Phantoms, and scan the area without touching down. That way we'll locate a ship without risk. Then when we do find it, a small task squad of about 15 people will infiltrate the ship, make sure it's clear, and launch the ship. Everyone else in their Phantoms will make sure any Flood outside the ship don't make their way in. When the ship is cleared and is preparing to enter slip-space, everyone will get in close enough to enter the field range and enter slip-space too."

It sounded like a good plan, it sounded like a damn good plan. It was a low risk mission, and they had no alternative in the first place. Johnson and the Arbiter began to line up everyone there to see who would be part of the task squad. The Grunts, to their relief, were excluded from this. The Arbiter and Johnson volunteered themselves automatically, and four more Elites did as well.

"All right, I'm thinking the remaining 9 in the group should all be Lekgolo, since they're so heavily armored, and resistant to Flood. And if we could get some invisibility shields for our armor if there is any that would be good too."

None of the Hunters complained about being one of 9 in the group, but when they tried to get one to go without its mate, it refused. So the Arbiter bumped up the number to 10 to have 5 pairs. Invisibility shields were sparse, and the Arbiter had to settle for using the primitive invisibility system he had on his armor now. Then they were off, approximately 45 persons total, 5 per craft.

Keyes, Johnson, the Arbiter, and a pair of Hunters led the way. The estimated time of arrival was exactly fourteen human minutes according to a Grunt in another ship. So they would get there at 23:20. Next to the Arbiter lay his weapons, a sword used by the zealots and a plasma rifle. The sergeant himself had a battle rifle and a rocket launcher. Currently he was keeping himself busy with it by loading the rockets into it.

"When I fire this at those parasitic bastards, they won't know what hit them" the sergeant remarked with a grin. "You know, if you had told me yesterday when at was at Earth that this is where I'd be, I wouldn't have believed you."

"I feel the same way. In fact, I thought I was going to be executed yesterday. Now I am in the honored position of Arbiter, and I'm trying to stop the last Prophet from finally achieving what the covenant has worked for since its founding ages ago."

A siren sounded in the cockpit, and the two of them rushed over to Keyes to see what was wrong.

A large ship that was bulky and black was leaving High Charity. The telltale energy field growing around it showed that it was about to make a slip-space jump. Right behind it was a smaller, purple ship firing at it while making evasive maneuvers. The larger ship seemed to be taking no damage from the fire, in spite of the fact that it didn't have any defensive force fields around it.

"There's a covenant ship large enough to enter slip-space leaving High Charity right now. In fact, it's about to enter slip-space. There's a smaller ship tailing it as well. I can't recognize either of the ships. The small one is real close, it'll enter slip-space with it."

A transmission crackled from one of the other Phantoms, and the voice of one of the Grunts that had escaped from High Charity came online.

"I-I recognize that ship, it belongs to the Space Pirates!"

The sound of lots of people talking at once came on the broadcast, and everyone wanted to know what they should do. Overzealous Elites would yell about blasting them back to the city, while sometimes a Grunt would get hold of the broadcast and make nonsensical, panicky screaming. Keyes stood up in frustration, and yelled onto the broadcast.

"ALRIGHT, EVERYONE BE QUIET! We are going to get in close to the field range, that ship is about to enter slip-space. I don't know for sure if it's headed for Earth, but it looks like a sure bet. I will contact that smaller ship and try to see if it's friend or foe. If it's foe, we'll all open fire on _both _the second we leave slip-space. OKAY?"

Everyone murmured assents of agreement, and Keyes switched the transmission to the small ship ahead of her.

"This is captain Miranda Keyes, are you friend or foe? I repeat, are you friend or foe?" The startled response she got back was the last person she or Sergeant Johnson had expected to hear from.

"Keyes, is that really you?" Cortana asked.

**Empty city  
2-19 20X9(Cosmic Year)  
19.21Hours**

Some of the Flood didn't pay much attention to her; they had targets of their own they were trying to kill. Probably five opened fire on her when she walked in, a few bullets hit her, but all of shots from a plasma weapon were a little slow and she dodged those with her space jumping. The Space Pirates however, knew her well. In between bursts of fire, the cries of "The Hunter!" They all retreated back to the ship while firing at Samus instead of the Flood. They were the exact same Pirates she had to fight in the Biological Space Labs. Their impressive leaps got them to their ship quickly. The strange parasitic monsters fighting the Pirates (who Samus didn't know as the Flood yet), followed them into the ship to the best of their ability. As the latch started to close, crowds of them piled into the ship.

Then an abomination that looked like the worst of these monsters came lumbering at quick but clumsy pace. Its gigantic mouth was its only visible feature, because everything else was covered by a mass of tentacles. Twelve tentacles shot out and grasped onto the closing latch, trying to break it open. Samus charged up a super ice missile and fired it at the beast. At the missile hit, a blast of extremely cold energy surrounded everything within ten feet.

The Flood that had been trying to get in the ship turned around angrily and started attacking Samus. Most of them charged her, while some of them shot their weapons at her. Samus ran head on with the impending crowd and mowed right through them with her screw attack.

BOOM!

One of the Flood she had been right next to exploded, and she was thrown in the opposite direction. Samus lay on the ground dazed and dizzy. Then her attackers were all on her. She felt her shields going down as each of them melee-attacked her. Five of those tiny squid-looking Flood attached themselves to her, and Samus felt her shields drain even faster.

She quickly went into her Morph-ball and planted the last Power Bomb she had. As it exploded, every single Flood around her disintegrated completely, only ashes remained of them. There were plenty of Flood left though. A tentacle from their leader prying the latch grabbed Samus by her arm cannon and flung her at itself. As Samus flew helplessly at the monster and the swarm of tentacles around it, she made a weak attempt to contact Adam. She barely got the word "Adam" out before she was swallowed by the tentacles.

Samus couldn't tell up from down, tentacles obscured her vision. Every single one of them was working to crush her. She tried to pull off her screw attack, but she couldn't move enough for that. Then she tried to go into morph-ball and plant normal bombs, but she couldn't even manage that. She was totally hopeless.

**High Charity Ruins  
10.21.2552(Military Calendar)  
22:50 **

It had been too late when Cortana noticed Samus. She had been so preoccupied trying to activate In Amber Clad's self-destruction sequence to notice anything when Samus entered the scene. The Space Pirate's cries of "Hunter!" were indistinguishable from the rest of the noise going on. In Amber Clad was too heavily damaged, the detonation system was completely unresponsive. She gave up and switched back to surveying the disaster scene. That was when she saw Samus, caught in the tentacles of the Gravemind. She tried to contact Samus, but the radio waves couldn't get through the tentacles.

Upset, Cortana returned to the surveillance system to see if anyone else was with Samus somewhere on High Charity. There wasn't, but she did see a ship flying throughout the city, calling out "Samus! Samus!" Knowing that this wasn't coincidence, Cortana contacted the ship.

"Hey, your armor-clad friend is in big trouble. Turn northwest and keep going until you find the battle scene. He's trapped in the tentacles of the largest monster there. Hurry though, I think he's dying."

The purple ship, which somewhat resembled an insect, turned 90 degrees to its right and went at a pace so fast it made a computer AI like herself jump. Ships didn't normally go this fast because of how much fuel was expended. Instead ships would make slip-space jumps, which had very little to do with fuel. The ship could probably pursue a covenant ship making a slip-space jump, although the ship didn't go quite that fast. Still, Cortana was very interested to see the technologies behind what made this ship run.

As the ship descended upon the battle scene, it fired not just on the Gravemind, but on all of the other flood as well. The artillery wasn't explosive like human weapons, but it wasn't entirely plasma, though it was like plasma. It resembled the lasers used in the factories that mass produced the weapons out of steel the human army used, and the ones that the covenant robots used. They ship lifted up into the sky as the Gravemind still had its death grip on the latch. With one strong heave it made its way into the ship, and dropped the Hunter from its tentacles.

Samus' suit was badly damaged, but she was still conscious. She still managed the graceful flips she always did before she landed on the ground. She walked over to the monitor where she had communicated with Master Chief last and waited for the ship. As it swooped low over her, Cortana appeared as her usual holographic self.

"What about me?" Cortana asked sarcastically.

A voice from the ship responded, for the first time. "Samus, it's okay. Take her with us."

Samus took Cortana out of the monitor, and let the beam from the ship take her back to the cockpit. She put Cortana into the ship's computer and walked off into her living quarters.

"Adam, I'm exhausted. I'm going to put the suit in the maintenance room, and then I'm going to take a nap. Stay on course with the Space Pirate ship, and wake me up if they do something eventful."

As Samus stepped out of the room, Cortana tried out the new system she was going to work with. It was a little constricting; there was already an AI construct in here taking care of everything. There wasn't much she could do without getting in the way. She contented to watch the ship's monitors as it closely pursued the Space Pirates, while performing evasive maneuvers and sometimes firing off a laser.

Then a few covenant ships appeared on radar, and a transmission came from one of them. It was the voice of Miranda Keyes, which totally took her off guard. Adam was preparing a response for her, when Cortana totally overrided him and sent back her reaction.

"Keyes is that really you?"


	3. Chapter 3:Delay

_Author's Notes: This one took longer to write than my other chapters, probably because I was distracted with other things. I enjoyed this one the most however, especially at the last part._**  
**

**Earth's Orbit  
10.21.2552(Military Calendar)  
22:40**

"Admiral, what orders do you have for me?"

"Well Master Chief, I suppose it's pretty obvious. But command will look upon it more favorably if I say it out loud. You need to eliminate the covenants onboard. Capture the Prophet of Truth if you can, but that will probably be more than a little difficult given your circumstance and it's not exactly top priority anyway. Contact me when your mission has been achieved, or if you need to tell me anything else important."

"Yes sir." Master Chief surveyed the area around him. It was all empty and bare; there was nothing around him but the empty metal walls, and a door at the end. As he approached it, the door automatically opened. It was a very narrow space with a ladder on the wall, and when Master Chief gripped the rungs it automatically began to run upwards as if it were on an invisible conveyor belt.

"If Cortana were here" he thought, "She would have a fit over the technologies and mechanics behind what made this run." When the ladder reached the ceiling, the chief looked behind him to see another door. When he stepped off, the door opened and with a sigh of relief, he saw that there were no soldiers waiting for him. There were sentinels that patrolled the room in a circle, but they took no interest in the Chief when they saw him. There were large amounts of covenant weapon crates around, with weapons of all kinds.

Master Chief checked the two weapons he had on him. The battery on his plasma rifle was almost dead, and his Brute shot was out of ammo. He vaguely remembered opening fire on all of the Flood in his way as he rushed on the final stretch to the Fore-runner ship. He decided on picking up two Brute rifles, but he wanted a third weapon on him first. As he looked around, he saw a weapon he hadn't seen in a long time. It was a Fuel Rod Cannon, but not the ridiculous golden kind he had picked up in High Charity. It was the kind he had the Special Ops. Grunts carry back on the Halo. These were a lot more effective, so he decided to keep it. So he picked up the two Brute rifles and kept moving on through the next door.

He found himself standing in some sort of makeshift sleeping quarters; the beds were made of metal, and the mattresses out of some synthetic material. The Brutes and Jackals were sound asleep on these beds. Apparently there were some Grunts that weren't brave enough to defect, because on the ground were sleeping Grunts curled up in their usual sleeping position. There weren't any Drones in here, Master Chief assumed that they probably didn't need as much sleep, or maybe not any sleep.

He decided to spare them, since stirring up trouble would probably alert everyone to his presence sooner. The next room was a long hallway, and running horizontally was a long glass window. He could see the dog fights happening all around the ship. The colorful, vibrant Covenant ships outnumbered the grey military ships easily. The sooner he took out the last Prophet and stopped this genocidal war, the better. Ahead of him were two huge double doors, this had to be where the Prophet of Truth was. But before he took another step; Brute royal guards and Fore-runner Sentinels came pouring out of the door. Then out came the Prophet of Truth himself, followed by a golden Enforcer.

"I see that you have followed us even as we stand at the very entrance to the Ark, Demon. Though you may have killed Regret yourself, and Mercy lies dead because of the Flood infection your allies have brought to High Charity, you won't stop the Great Journey! Kill this Demon!"

The Prophet of Truth retreated back to the room, as Brutes and Sentinels opened fire. The golden Enforcer merely turned to its left, and shot at the glass. As the glass blew open, the shots of plasma from the Brutes were sucked out into the vacuum of space before they had reached the Spartan. But as the shots of plasma were sucked out into the vacuum of space, so were the Brutes, and Master Chief. The sentinels and the Enforcer managed to use their propulsion systems to avoid being sucked out of the ship.

There was no ship to catch him, and there was no plan. As he felt himself being thrown into that void of space; the Spartan once known as John in long time ago, relaxed and let fate take him.

**Entering slip-space  
10.21.2552(Military Calendar)  
23:15**

"Miranda Keyes, I have a lot I need to inform you about. You need to retrieve me or the person in this ship needs to do it. The last Prophet is heading towards Earth; they want to 'finish what they started'."

"I know" Miranda Keyes replied, "There's something on Earth they want, called the Ark. We can't get you now, we're about to enter slip-space with that huge ship you're in pursuit of. We're sure they're allied with covenant. "

"Well not anymore Keyes. Unless the crew is extremely lucky, they're all probably Flood by now."

Before Miranda could reply (probably with disbelief), they all began to enter slip-space. Cortana snapped at the AI running the ship, and told it to quit moving the ship around so much while they were in slip-space, it was dangerous. The ship shook with a strong force of turbulence, which was normal for one this small to enter slip-space. Samus would probably wake up from this soon, which was good. Cortana needed to be reunited back with Keyes as soon as possible. After that, their next objective would be to blow the Gravemind and its army of Flood to hell as soon as possible.

Much to their surprise and disappointment, they weren't at Earth. Cortana was the only one who could immediately recognize where the slip-space jump had really taken them. They were at Planet Reach, or at least what was left of it. The Covenant had destroyed all the human forces here, and had gassed the planet. Now they were at an empty space station, named REACH-15. REACH-15 was one of the only space stations in Reach's orbit that had been successfully evacuated when the covenant had invaded. Since it wasn't completely destroyed by the Covenant like everything else, Cortana guessed they had used it as a base during the operation.

Now there were no Covenant ships, but ships of the same kind that had taken them into slip-space. Most of the docked ships they were departing and taking off for slip-space. If they were allied with the Covenant, _these_ ships entering slip-space were going to Earth then. The AI, Adam, maneuvered the ship to behind the squad of Phantoms accompanying them. Cortana grimaced as the ship filled with Flood docked on REACH-15. Though the ship looked innocent, instead of crew looking to refuel the ship, there were a swarm of parasites looking to feed and infest.

Miranda Keyes came back on the broadcast, "Okay everyone. That ship is filled with Flood, but we don't have adequate firepower in these ships to handle them. We need to dock on there, which will be easy enough, and take a Space Pirate ship instead. Since Johnson and I are humans, we will stay inside to avoid suspicion, but everyone else leave to secure a ship. Then, take out as much Space Pirates and Flood as you can."

Then the AI on the ship responded for the first time since picking up Cortana, "I should wake up Samus and inform her of these plans then." But as the Phantoms moved in, the latch door burst open and the Flood started pouring out of the ship.

"Okay everyone, we'll have to make this quick! We don't have the time to try to sneak our way into a ship anymore! Get a ship and kill as many as possible on the way!" Sergeant Johnson yelled on the broadcast. When the Phantoms descended and stopped, everyone jumped out with their plasma weapons firing as they charged to the nearest ship.

**Location: Unknown  
Date: Unknown  
Time: Error-clock function damaged.**

Master Chief couldn't move at all. He didn't know where he was, and all he could see was bright lights surrounding him. Then he heard the sound of an automated door slide open, and a shadowy figure that blocked out the light in front of him.

"Well, this is quite an odd coincidence, but not an unhappy one. Though some of us know you as 'Demon', I'm sure we'll get used to calling you by your appropriate name in time, 'Master Chief'."

**Space Pirate ship: "The Crimson Scythe"  
2-19 20X9(Cosmic Year)  
19.80 Hours**

As the rebel Covenant forces pilled out of their ships and the Flood poured out of theirs, he watched with a sadistic grin. The Flood were a useful tool, albeit one that was hard to control. The leaders of this sect of religious nuts had hired them as mercenaries in this war of theirs, that much was true. But he did not keep his leadership status over the now shaky Space Pirate organization by being a fool, even if the position had been handed to him after the death of Mother Brain. The doctrine of the Covenant movement demanded that anyone who did not join their sect be eliminated; they would be no exception if they gave the Covenant the opportunity.

What was the best way to deal with this? The new head of the Space Pirates had made a perfect plan. It would destroy the Covenant without drawing direct attention to defection of the Space Pirates, and it would also take care of the humans so that there would be no backlash once the Covenant was eliminated. His plan was to have an organized outbreak of the Flood. It was a very precise plan, and not even unexpected variables thrown into the equation like these Covenant rebels could not throw it off course.

The Space Pirate ship "Bladed Storm", that had landed on the desolation of High Charity had landed there intentionally. The crew, "conveniently" made up of suspected defects to the Space Pirates and members with a bad record, was told to land there for a rescue mission for the Prophet of Mercy that would surely earn themselves a great reward from the Covenant hierarchy itself. Planning that mission out alone was hard, he had found out about the Flood through pure luck, and discovering the recent location of Flood on High Charity had taken some advanced hacking into restricted covenant databanks.

The crew of the Bladed Storm was doomed, he knew it of course. The Prophet of Mercy was long dead (he had even watched the surveillance video of him dying), and the Flood were too powerful for a rescue team of that size. The Flood certainly weren't navigating the Bladed Storm to REACH-15 themselves either. When enough Flood had entered the ship he activated a program that he had snuck on there to put the ship's controls under his power. That odd, sentient leader of the Flood that called itself "Gravemind" was frustrated when it found it couldn't direct the ship itself of course, but it let the ship run its course. The Gravemind expressed out loud the thought that the ship would make its course to Earth eventually. From there he had sent the Bladed Storm to REACH-15 for the sake of feeding and increasing in number, even if it meant the sacrifice of some troops.

Once the feeding time for the Flood on REACH-15 was over? The Gravemind would direct its disgusting children back into ship so that they could head for Earth. That Gravemind had an obsession with getting to Earth to interrupt whatever the Covenant wanted to initiate; which was lucky, because according the plan the Flood needed to get to Earth as soon as possible. Once the Flood reached Earth, there would be nothing else needed to be done. The Flood would spread, and the humans on Earth would become extinct at the hands of these parasites. With no humans for back-up support on earth, the human forces fighting the battle in Space would finally be wiped out, and the Covenant would descend into Earth, only to be wiped out by the same parasites. Only the Space Pirates would remain.

There was only one thing that could interrupt his plans, and that was the Gravemind. The Flood were mindless by nature, following only their insatiable instinct to feed. This Gravemind that served as the brain for the Flood could bring order and organization to the Flood, which would threaten the mission. The head of the Space Pirates was sure that the Gravemind was probably suspicious of the ship that was transporting them, and would possibly do something to interfere with his plans. The Gravemind would need to be dealt with in the very near future.

But as he looked to the monitor, another thing caught his eye and almost made him choke. There was a purple ship that he knew from the Space Pirate public records. It was the new ship of the Hunter, Samus Aran. That made two potential things that could screw up his plans. He gulped uneasily at the thought that the person he was cloned from was dead because of her.

But he regained his posture and reassured himself of victory. After all, he had something that could not only destroy the Gravemind and the Hunter, but could also keep the Flood in check and make sure that a Flood outbreak never happened to the rest of the Space Pirates. He had the Metroids.


End file.
